Rega has always been famous for the quality
and quantity of bass they’ve been able to
extract from small woofers and cabinets. Their
legendary (and now discontinued) Ela speaker
used transmission-line loading for its tiny
3.5-inch woofer, producing a level and quality
of bass response in small rooms that had one
questioning the existence of the laws of
physics. The R7 and R9 continue the Rega
tradition of the transmission-line loading
principle, building on what they learned from
the Ela and further refining and improving it.

Transmission-line loading aims at absorbing
the rearward wave of the bass driver by means
of a tunnel, line, or port that ultimately
vents outside of the cabinet. Unlike the
acoustic suspension system which uses
rear-wave energy to compress a sealed volume
of air which then serves as a spring to the
loosely suspended driver, or the now almost
universal bass-reflex principle, which
radiates sound from the rearward wave out
through a tuned port, the transmission line
aims to eliminate any perturbations of the
woofer’s motion by the rearward wave. Done
successfully, the result is tight and clean
transient response, with no overhang,
sluggishness or weird ‘phasi-ness.’

Inspired by PBS’s broadcast of the Cream
Reunion Concert, I ran through the CD and DVD
documents of the concert, reveling in Jack
Bruce’s virtuoso bass playing and fully
understanding his interplay with Ginger
Baker’s drumming and Eric Clapton’s energized
guitar work (Clapton hasn’t played this well
since the demise of Blind Faith.) This
naturally led to revisiting all my old Cream
recordings. Which then led to listening to
rock bands that used double drummers – The
Allman Brothers and The Grateful Dead. Then I
was off on a Ron Carter kick, listening to a
dozen or so or his performances, both as
sideman and leader. Next it was West African
master drummer recordings; then on to Persian
and Indian sitar/santur/tabla performances.
These kinds of spontaneous listening orgies
are what great audio products should inspire.
The Rega R7 produced the most musically
satisfying bass performance of any speaker in
my memory. (I have not yet heard the Rega R9.)

Extracting this level of bass performance
depends ultimately on the partnering
amplifier’s bass control, resolution. and
rhythmic certainty. Like most contemporary
speaker designs, the Rega R7 assumes high
damping factor and general solid state bass
control. Tube amp owners in particular should
make sure their amps have sufficient control
and definition. I got excellent results from
my antique Marantz 1060 transistor integrated
amp, the budget-priced Cambridge Azur 640A,
Rotel’s RB 980BX, and the Cyrus 8vs. Needless
to say, Rega’s own amplifiers are an obvious
first choice. An additional level of
resolution in bass clarity is available
through use of the Stillpoints Universal
Resonance Dampers. Though many listeners
resist isolation devices for speakers
(unaware, perhaps, that speaker spikes are in
fact isolation devices themselves) I find them
absolutely essentially to extract all that a
system is capable of producing. Similarly one
can achieve even greater bass authority,
dynamics and control through bi-amping; but
since I did not have 2 identical power amps I
could not test this.

The Rega R7 is chameleon-like in response to
ancillary gear. Its inherent neutrality and
transparency makes differences in component
quality clear and unambiguous, making
component-matching choices easy and obvious.
The exceptional stage width of the Cyrus CD8x
CD player, for example, was faithfully
rendered, as was that CD player’s superb high
frequency response. The stereo illusion is
laid out with a precision that matches the
best of near-field mini-monitor performance,
and is limited only by recording quality and
the capacities of the partnering gear. The
difference between analogue and digital
sources is immediately obvious, the
differences in performance of my 4 reference
turntables easy to hear and to judge. The R7’s
inherent neutrality means that moving-coil
cartridges with a rising top end will sound
unnatural, as will cabling used as a tone
control to ‘brighten things up.’ The R7’s are
not forgiving of falsely bright ancillaries. I
got the best results with cables that were
neutral in response, rich in harmonic content,
and possessing exceptional timing and rhythmic
qualities.

Since I did not have Rega electronics on hand,
I used components possessing the nearest
equivalent sonic and musical signature - the
classic Hegeman Hapi Two preamp and Rotel
RB980BX power amp – for much of my listening.
Yet even with my highest resolution gear the
R7’s were not outclassed. They did not match
my Sound Lab Dynastat’s 6-foot tall
electrostatic panels in ultimate midrange
resolution, but then the laws of physics
concerning starting and stopping masses
preclude any dynamic moving-coil driver from
matching an effectively mass-less membrane.
Bass was actually clearer and more transparent
to the music with the R7 however.

Like all Rega products, the R7 excels at
music. Timing –the essence of music -is superb
in all its musical manifestations. The
transient envelope of each note is superbly
rendered, leading to easy identification of
instruments and their physical placement.
Timing between notes - and thus tempo, rhythm,
and urge - is equally excellent, as is the
exact placement in time of contributing notes
from ensemble players, leading to clear
communication of the flow and structure of the
music. Fine detail and accurate tracking of
small volume changes allows full communication
of the subtleties, nuances, and artistry of
the playing, and the speaker’s highly
articulate diction leads to clear parsing and
punctuation of musical lines and phrases. Add
exemplary bass definition, superb lyric
comprehension and an ability to create as
large and coherent a soundstage as the
recording contains and you get an unusually
successful loudspeaker. The R7 combines the
true-to-the-music philosophy of all Rega
products with the resolution and imaging
demands of the audiophile world. Now one can
be a music lover and an audiophile without
compromise. The R7 is exceptional by any
standard; factor in its $2495 price and it
becomes an absolute bargain. The highest of
recommendations.